Adventures Of Mini-Goddess
Publisher
Geneon/MVM
Director
Hiroko KazuiHiroko Kazui, Yasuhiro Matsumura
Production
Oriental Light and Magic
Country of origin
Japan
Format
Series
Running time
48 episodes / 7 minutes
Year
1998
Adventures Of Mini-Goddess Volume 1: The Gan-Chan Files
By otaku_kei
9th Mar 05  Whilst I may have been into anime for many years the Ah! My Goddess series has always eluded me so I came to this title with absolutely no idea what to expect. This may well have been the reason why this show has made such a little impact upon me, as it appears that this title would truly benefit from an existing appreciation of the main show. So what is this show about then? Well as the rather cheesy prologue opening states the three goddesses Belldandy, Urd and Skuld all make themselves tiny to have adventures alongside their rat friend Gan-Chan. This all has absolutely no bearing on the main show as this ends up nothing more than a series of crazy comedy skits. With all of these ‘Mini-adventures’ coming in at around 5 minutes they make for easy ‘popcorn’ viewing, but unfortunately I found they were pretty light on entertainment value. We have a range of stories concentrating on Urd & co. (Belldandy making very few appearances), stories that range from treasure hunting in the attic, Gan-Chan’s dreams of flying and space travel. We also have episodes where the Goddesses try to get an obese Gan-Chan to shed some pounds, but far and above all of these are the great parodies of the Godzilla movies as Gan-Chan is mutated to gigantic proportions and the Goddesses Have to defeat him. All in all a wide variety of set-ups with a lot of hit-or-miss comedy moments, but just not enough to really grab and hold my attention. For a light-hearted comedy this show really did fail to sparkle on the comedic front. Sure some jokes did produce a chuckle or two, and the Godzilla parodies were more amusing than most of the other episodes but much of the comedy felt flat. The Godzilla parodies clearly had a familiar icon and movie franchise with which to poke fun at, but the rest of the episodes clearly rely on an appreciation of the craziness of Urd and Skuld. But whilst the show may not have appealed to me it was not without its worth. It is, as a show, great for just having little breaks for to watch perhaps an episode or two to just wind down from the more serious shows that I’m sure you are working through. Also of special mention is the closing track to the show that perfectly complements Belldandy fruitlessly searching for her friends that never fails to bring heartfelt empathy for her plight. I think that for the legions of Goddess fans out there this is going to be a guaranteed purchase and are sure to enjoy this show. But unless you have an unrelenting desire for saccharine storytelling or are just very easily amused then this is not going to be for you. This only gets a four out of ten due to the few Godzilla episodes and the sweet ending music… 4/10
-- otaku_kei 9th Mar 05
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